Successor Trustee Checklist: First 30 Days in California

Quick answer: A California successor trustee has three hard deadlines in the first 90 days. The Probate Code § 16061.7 notification goes out within 60 days of death. If the settlor ever received Medi-Cal, notice to the Department of Health Care Services is due within 90 days under Probate Code § 215. The change in ownership statement is due to the county assessor within 150 days. None of them announces itself, and the original will has to be lodged with the court within 30 days on top of that.

Three deadlines run against a California successor trustee in the first 90 days, and none of them arrives in the mail. A parent dies, the family grieves, somebody finally opens the binder in month four, and two of the three have already passed.

You are now a fiduciary. The standard is not whether you did your best under the circumstances. It is whether you did what the Probate Code requires, and you are personally answerable for the difference. The good news is that the first 90 days is a list, and the list is finite.

Week one: secure everything, distribute nothing

Order ten certified death certificates

Every bank, brokerage, insurance company, county recorder, and pension office wants its own certified copy, and none of them gives it back. Ten is the working number for an estate with a house and a handful of accounts. If there is real property in more than one county, order fifteen. The funeral home orders them for you in the first week, which is the easy path.

Read the entire trust, including every amendment

All of it, including the boring middle. You are about to be judged against this document, and the parts that matter are rarely at the front.

Find the distribution provisions, the trustee powers, the successor trustee language that put you in the seat, and any provision about your compensation. Then check whether there are amendments and read them in order, because an amendment from 2018 can reverse the paragraph you just read from 2009. If there is a restatement, it replaces everything before it.

Take control of the property and keep it insured

You have an affirmative duty to take reasonable steps to take control of and preserve the trust property under Probate Code § 16006. Lock the house, find the accounts, and stop the bleeding.

Then call the homeowner’s carrier and tell them the house is unoccupied. Most policies suspend or limit coverage after 30 or 60 days of vacancy. A pipe breaks in month three, the carrier learns the house has been empty since the death, and the claim is denied. A denied claim on an uninsured house is a loss the beneficiaries will look to you for.

Locate the accounts and the digital assets

Bank and brokerage accounts, retirement accounts, life insurance, the safe deposit box, and the accounts that exist only as logins. Get a date-of-death statement from every institution while you are there, because you need those values twice, once for the accounting and once for income tax basis.

Do not distribute anything, and do not move in

Not in the first 90 days. Debts, taxes, and the 120-day contest window all come first, and a trustee who distributes early and comes up short pays the difference personally.

Do not move into the house either, even if the trust says you eventually get it, and even if you are already living there. A trustee occupying trust property rent free while the other beneficiaries wait is the single most reliable way this turns into litigation. Family will push on both points. “I am not allowed to yet” is the whole answer.

Weeks two through four: the filings that start clocks

Lodge the original will with the Superior Court within 30 days

Almost every trust comes with a pour-over will, and the original of that will must be delivered to the clerk of the Superior Court in the county where the estate would be administered within 30 days of learning of the death, with a copy mailed to the executor named in it. That is Probate Code § 8200. The fee is $50 under Government Code section 70626(d).

Lodging is not opening probate. It is a filing, and it is required whether or not probate ever happens. The custodian who sits on the will is liable for the damages the delay causes.

Send the notification under Probate Code § 16061.7 within 60 days

This is the deadline that gets missed. When a revocable trust becomes irrevocable because the settlor died, the trustee has 60 days to serve a written notification on every beneficiary of the trust and every heir at law of the settlor.

Note who is on that list. Not only the people who inherit. Every heir, including the disinherited son nobody has spoken to in twelve years. He gets the notice too.

The contents are set by statute, including a warning that the recipient has 120 days to contest and a statement that they may request a complete copy of the terms of the trust. Serving the notice starts that 120-day clock under Probate Code § 16061.8. Failing to serve it means the clock never starts, which leaves the trust contestable indefinitely and leaves you exposed to the damages the delay causes. Use a form that tracks the statute rather than writing a letter from scratch.

Get an EIN and open a trust bank account

While the settlor was alive the trust used their Social Security number. Now it needs its own. The EIN application takes about fifteen minutes online.

Then open one bank account in the trust’s name and run everything through it. Every dollar in, every dollar out, one account. Doing this in the first month is what makes the accounting possible later.

Start the ledger on day one

Every receipt, every disbursement, the date, the amount, and what it was for. A spreadsheet is fine. A shoebox is not.

You have a duty to keep the beneficiaries reasonably informed under Probate Code § 16060 and to account under Probate Code § 16062. Reconstructing eight months of transactions from memory and bank statements is miserable work, and every gap in it looks like something to a beneficiary who is already suspicious.

Keep everything separate, and buy nothing from the trust

Trust money stays in the trust account. Not your account, not temporarily, not even when you intend to pay it straight back. Commingling is a breach on its own under Probate Code § 16009, and it converts an honest mistake into an accusation you cannot clear.

Self-dealing works the same way. If you want to buy the house, rent the house, or hire your own company to fix the house, the answer is not automatically no, but it is never yours to decide alone. Probate Code § 16004 governs. Get the beneficiaries’ written consent or court approval first.

Days 30 to 150: the three deadlines nobody tells you about

Notice to the Department of Health Care Services within 90 days

If the settlor received health care under Medi-Cal and you are required to send the § 16061.7 notification, you must also give notice to the Director of Health Care Services within 90 days of the date of death. That is Probate Code § 215.

This one is missed constantly, because trustees think of Medi-Cal recovery as a probate problem. Since 2017 recovery reaches only the probate estate, so a funded trust usually defeats the claim. The notice is still required. See how Medi-Cal estate recovery actually works.

Change in ownership statement to the assessor within 150 days

Any death that changes ownership of California real property triggers a Change in Ownership Statement, Death of Real Property Owner, filed with the county recorder or assessor within 150 days of death under Revenue and Taxation Code section 480(b).

File it even when you believe an exclusion applies, because the exclusion claim usually rides on this filing. If the house is going to a child who is moving in, the homeowners’ exemption also has to be claimed within one year of the transfer or the Proposition 19 exclusion is lost retroactively. Calendar both dates now, and read how to file the Prop 19 exclusion before the year runs.

Get a real appraisal on the real property

Not a broker’s opinion and not a website estimate. A written appraisal as of the date of death, from a licensed appraiser.

Assets in a trust generally take a new income tax basis equal to date-of-death fair market value. If the house sells eighteen months later for more than the appraised value, the taxable gain is only the difference. Without a contemporaneous appraisal you are arguing about basis using a number you reconstructed after the fact, and a low guess costs the beneficiaries real money in capital gains. The appraisal costs a few hundred dollars and skipping it is the most expensive economy on this list.

What the next 90 days look like

Months four through twelve are appraisals, tax returns, selling what needs selling, and getting to a point where distribution is safe. Most trust administrations run nine to eighteen months, and the ones that run longer usually do so because of something that happened, or did not happen, in the first 90 days. How long trust administration takes covers the rest of the calendar.

The honest caveat

This is the general sequence for a straightforward California trust with a house and some accounts. A trust holding a business, out-of-state real property, a special needs beneficiary, or a beneficiary who has already hired a lawyer is a different job with different deadlines. If any of those describe your situation, the list above is where you start and not where you stop.

Frequently Asked Questions

What should a successor trustee do in the first week after death?

Order ten certified death certificates, read the entire trust including every amendment, secure the house and tell the insurance carrier it is unoccupied, locate the accounts and get date-of-death values, and distribute nothing. The legal deadlines start in week two, but the week-one work is what makes them possible to hit.

When must a trustee send the 16061.7 notice?

Within 60 days of the date the trust became irrevocable, which for most families is the date of the settlor’s death. It goes to every beneficiary of the trust and every heir at law of the settlor, including heirs who inherit nothing. Serving it starts the 120-day period in which someone can contest the trust under Probate Code § 16061.8. If you never serve it, that contest window never closes.

Does a trustee need an EIN for the trust?

Yes, after the settlor dies. While the settlor was alive the revocable trust used their Social Security number. Once it becomes irrevocable it is a separate taxpayer and needs its own employer identification number, which you apply for directly with the IRS. You need it to open the trust bank account.

Should a trustee distribute assets right away?

No. Debts, taxes, and the 120-day contest window come first. A trustee who distributes early and then finds the trust is short pays the difference personally. Beneficiaries will ask, sometimes with a good reason, and the correct answer is that distribution comes after the creditor and contest periods close.

Does a trustee have to tell the state if the person was on Medi-Cal?

Yes. If the settlor received Medi-Cal benefits and you are required to send the § 16061.7 notification, Probate Code § 215 requires notice to the Director of Health Care Services within 90 days of the date of death. This is separate from the beneficiary notification and it is missed often.

When should a trustee hire an attorney?

Before the 60-day notice goes out, if you can. The notification has statutory contents and serving a defective one can leave the contest window open. Beyond that, a trust holding real property, a business, or a beneficiary who has already retained counsel is not a do-it-yourself administration. Trustee fees and reasonable attorney fees are generally payable from the trust rather than from your own pocket.

What to do next

If you were just appointed, what a successor trustee actually does covers the role, and the first 30 days guide is the short version of this page. For what the job pays and what it costs, see what trust administration costs and trustee compensation. If the beneficiaries are already asking questions, the duty to inform and account sets out what you owe them. If you would rather not serve at all, declining to serve explains how. If there is no trust and you are looking at court, start with the California probate timeline.

Talk to Ridley Law

If you are inside the first 60 days, the notification is the one to move on today. Send us the trust and the date of death and we will tell you exactly who has to be served and when the clock runs out. The practice is fully remote, so nothing here requires a drive. Talk to Eric.